But glimmer of hope as he says lockdown IS working

plans to toughen coronavirus restrictions have been put on hold by Boris Johnson amid signs the national lockdown in England is working.

The prime Minister insisted he will keep in reserve the option of strengthening measures, but he expressed hope that infection numbers are starting to come under control.

His comments came as hospital admissions in london and the south East fell for the first time since before Christmas.

although Mr Johnson warned of the possibility of intensive care units being overwhelmed, the seven- day total of admissions to hospital recorded in the capital on sunday was 5,919 – down 131 on the previous day and the first fall since December 2.

The number of admissions in the south East fell by 82 to 4,551, in the first decline since December 23.

Figures show that despite the falling seven-day average, there were still 734 admissions recorded on sunday in london, making it among the 20 busiest days recorded since the start of the pandemic, according to the Health service Journal.

and hospital admissions are still rising across the five other regions in England with bed occupancy from Covid-19 up to 22 per cent in a week.

The situation has become so critical in hospitals that those in the worst affected areas have sent patients to other trusts and King’s College Hospital suggested patients could be sent to hotels to free up beds for critical coronavirus cases.

Government statistics also show that despite yesterday’s record death toll, the UK’s outbreak is finally starting to slow, with fewer people testing positive for coronavirus.

another 47,525 positive tests were announced yesterday a fall of 23.7 per cent on last Wednesday’s toll of 62,322. It is the fourth day in a row that infections have dropped week-on-week.

at prime Minister’s Questions yesterday, labour leader sir Keir starmer said the current restrictions are ‘not strong enough to control the virus’.

He asked: ‘Can the prime Minister tell us when infection rates are much higher than in March, when hospital admissions are much higher than last March, when death rates are much higher than last March, why on earth are restrictions weaker than last March?’

Mr Johnson said the country was in the ‘toughest of times’. He promised to keep restrictions ‘under constant review’ and said he would ‘not rule out’ toughening them up. But he added: ‘It is important to stress these are early days, but we are now seeing the beginnings of some signs that it [the national lockdown] is starting to have an effect in many parts of the country, but by no means everywhere. It is early days and people must keep their discipline and enforcing the rules and work together to rollout that vaccine.’

and asked if he thought the lockdown was working, the Government’s chief scientific adviser said last night: ‘The answer is yes it looks like it is and things are flattening off at least in some places, not everywhere, some places are still going up.’

In an interview on ITV’s peston programme, sir patrick Vallance added: ‘There are some signs that the infection rate may be levelling off or even coming down in some places as a result of the fact that people have been really good at sticking to the stay at Home message, and so the more we can do that, the more we’ll see, hopefully, this coming down further. But there’ll be a lag, of course, before that translates into hospitalisation and death.’

Government scientists dismissed calls for face masks to be mandatory outdoors and for the two-metre social distancing rule to be increased to three metres.

professor Jonathan Van-Tam, the deputy chief medical officer, said an increase in the social distancing recommendation would play little role in controlling the spread of the new coronavirus variant.

‘Unless we were saying that the variant makes you cough in a different way or cough more violently, I can’t see how you can gain that extra distance, like in the long jump as it were,’ he told lBC.

On face masks, prof Van Tam said: ‘My view remains that the really highrisk environments for transmission are indoor spaces and the government advice is to wear masks or face coverings in indoor spaces. I agree with that and frankly I do that.’

‘People must keep their discipline’